Nearly 500 Afghan Refugees Deported from Turkey

TOLOnews reached out to some of the deportees, who complained about mistreatment of Turkish forces with them.

Turkish media reported that at least 500 Afghan refugees have been deported by Ankara and that more than 5,000 others are in detention, who will also be deported soon.

TOLOnews reached out to some of the deportees, who complained about mistreatment of Turkish forces with them.

Bilal, a second year student of the faculty of political science, said that he went to Turkey seven months ago to find a job but he was reported.

“We didn’t have the right to talk. They would just beat us until they get tired,” Bilal said.

“They tightened our hands and feet. They wouldn’t feed us well. They would give two peices of bread with food for four people,” said Akram, an Afghan national deported from Turkey.

Anadolu Agency said that Ankara is due to deport nearly 20,000 refugees, of whom over 5,000 are Afghans.

“The government of Turkey had severed the conditions for Afghan refugees and no refugee can take asylum under the current situation,” said Maazullah Sultan Oghlo, an Afghan refugee in Turkey.

The Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation said that the Islamic Emirate has held talks with Turkish officials about the situation of Afghan refugees there.

“We are in contact to stop the process of deportation of Afghans,” said Abdul Mutalib Haqqani, a spokesman for the ministry.

“The international law for the refugees suggests host countries to treat well with refugees,” said Abdul Malik Afghan, a refugees rights activist.

Earlier, Turkish media reported that out of 124,000 undocumented refugees, 68,000 of them were Afghans in 2022.

Nearly 500 Afghan Refugees Deported from Turkey
read more

Deadly ‘suicide’ blast outside Afghan foreign ministry in Kabul

Al Jazeera

At least 20 people have been killed after a suspected suicide bomber detonated himself outside the foreign ministry in Kabul in the second major attack in the Afghan capital this year, according to a Taliban official.

Ustad Fareedun, an official at the Taliban-run information ministry, told Reuters that the bomber had planned to enter the foreign ministry but failed. He added that at least 20 people were killed and many others injured in the blast.

A photo of the area, confirmed by official sources, showed at least nine people wounded or killed, lying outside the ministry as security forces attended to them.

Kabul police chief spokesman Khalid Zadran said said security teams have been deployed to the site. He said that at least five people were killed and several wounded in the blast.

The blast hit about 4pm local time (11:30 GMT) on Wednesday, Zadran said.

Taliban foreign and interior ministry officials have yet to comment on the deadly explosion.

Obaidullah Baheer, Lecturer at the American University of Afghanistan, Kabul, said that the discrepancies in casualty figures are ‘troubling’.

“We have seen the Taliban do this before. It does not help the security of the city to deny numbers of the actual casualties. So, a lot of questions, little answers,” he told Al Jazeera.

Baheer added that the blast site is in a very high security area. “There are multiple checkpoints. You have to have specific documents to access that street,” he said.

The blast reportedly happened when a Chinese delegation was meeting the Taliban at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Deadly ‘suicide’ blast outside Afghan foreign ministry in Kabul
read more

Pakistan sends back hundreds of Afghan refugees to face Taliban repression

in Karachi
The Guardian
Tue 10 Jan 2023
About 250,000 Afghan asylum seekers have arrived in Pakistan since August 2021, but a migrant crackdown has left many of them in fear of being jailed or deported

More than 600 Afghans have been deported from Pakistan in the past three days, and hundreds more face expulsion in a renewed crackdown on migrants.

On Saturday, 302 people were sent back to Afghanistan from Sindh province and 303 on Monday, including 63 women and 71 children. A further 800 people are expected to be deported in the coming days.

Last summer, authorities began deporting Afghans for illegally entering the country, but arrests and detentions have increased since October. Nearly 1,400 Afghans, including 129 women and 178 children, have been detained in Karachi and Hyderabad alone, the largest number of arrests made to date in Pakistan, say lawyers.

Pakistan has not adopted the UN Refugee Convention 1951, which confers a legal duty on countries to protect people fleeing serious harm.

Moniza Kakar, a Karachi-based human rights lawyer, said nearly 400 of the arrested Afghans had valid visas on their passports or proof-of-residence cards, which they said were confiscated by police before they were jailed.

Umer Ijaz Gilani, an Islamabad-based lawyer, said deporting Afghan asylum seekers was a “clear violation of the non-refoulement principle” (forcibly returning refugees or asylum seekers where they may be persecuted). He urged the Pakistan government’s National Commission for Human Rights (NCHR) to direct state authorities to stop the deportations.

“The NCHR has the jurisdiction … if it fails to exercise it, we might go to the high court,” said Gilani, who is supporting 100 Afghan human rights defenders seeking asylum in Islamabad. He said his clients were extremely disturbed about the arrests in Sindh.

Farah Zia, the director of the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, condemned the treatment of Afghans, particularly the arrests of women and children “because their vulnerability is compounded by their gender and age and lack of connections with local networks”.

Last year, the commission wrote to the government, urging it to develop a more humane policy towards Afghan refugees.

The Sindh authorities have defended their actions. “The government is only taking action against illegal immigrants; those living without a valid travel document,” said their spokesperson Murtaza Wahab.

Nida Amiri*, a registered asylum seeker in Karachi, told of “sleepless nights” since the crackdown. Her husband, a prominent government official, is in hiding in Afghanistan. “I have headaches, and my blood pressure refuses to come down,” said Amiri, 47, who left Kabul in December 2021 and is now working as a cook.

She added: “I would rather die in prison than return to Kabul, where we cannot even breathe freely.”

She has a registration card from the Society for Human Rights and Prisoners’ Aid (Sharp), which partners with the UN high commissioner for refugees (UNHCR) to initially assess asylum cases. But a Sharp employee said the card “cannot save her from being hauled in”.

Amiri’s 21-year old daughter, Afshaneh Noor, said that living in Pakistan may not be easy, but if she was sent back she would be “a prisoner in my home”. “It’s the worst place on Earth to be in for a woman, right now,” she said.

Her 14-year-old sister and nine-year-old brother are no longer allowed to go to school, she said, because their mother is so worried they’ll be detained. “She has told us to always carry the Sharp card and to avoid leaving the home unless absolutely necessary,” said Noor. “We tell people we are from Chitral [a region in northern Pakistan bordering Afghanistan].”

Nadera Najeeb*, 43, a widow and mother of six, belongs to the Hazara community, a predominantly Shia Muslim minority group persecuted by the Taliban. She entered Pakistan illegally with five of her children – two sons and three daughters – two months ago. “I was forced to run away, otherwise my daughters would be raped by the Taliban,” she said. Before leaving, she married her eldest daughter to a cousin’s son, leaving her in Kabul.

Najeeb, who works at a fishery in Karachi, has begun to wear a black abaya – a long, loose coat that covers her head and face so that only her eyes show. “This way no one can tell I’m an Afghan or belong to the Hazara community,” she said. “I took this difficult journey to keep my kids safe; if we’re put behind bars and then sent back, all this will be for nothing.”

Qaiser Khan Afridi, a UNHCR spokesperson, said the organisation is working to identify the most vulnerable asylum cases for resettlement, including women-headed households and families with children at risk. The UNHCR was striving to find “durable solutions” for refugees, but it was up to governments to grant asylum.

“Resettlement, unfortunately, cannot be available for the entire refugee population as the opportunities are limited,” he said.

*Names have been changed to protect identities

Pakistan sends back hundreds of Afghan refugees to face Taliban repression
read more

Taliban hard-liners consolidate control with crackdown on women

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Taliban hard-liners are consolidating their control over Afghanistan with the recent bans on women’s education and work, overriding the wishes of some Taliban officials in the capital, Kabul, and at the provincial level, according to government and aid officials.

The Taliban’s supreme leader, Haibatullah Akhundzada, and his fellow ultraconservatives based in Afghanistan’s second city of Kandahar are cracking down on social freedoms as their movement transitions from primarily waging an insurgency to governing a large, diverse country.

The draconian restrictions issued by Akhundzada last month, banning women from attending universities and from working for international organizations, demonstrated that real authority continues to reside in Kandahar rather than in Kabul, home to Taliban ministries and the group’s acting prime minister.

“This is [the supreme leader] taking more control” over national policy and how his directives are followed in Kabul and elsewhere, said an aid official in Kabul with direct knowledge of negotiations within Taliban leadership. The official, like others interviewed for this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss ongoing negotiations or internal policy disagreements.

Akhundzada, an ultraconservative Muslim cleric, has led the Taliban since 2016, rarely appearing in public but increasingly meeting in private with local religious officials. Despite having appointed Taliban ministers and governors after the collapse of Afghanistan’s previous government in 2021, Akhundzada retains the final say on all major national policy decisions.

“At first, we were just sent guidelines” from the supreme leader for formulating policy, said one Taliban official in Kabul at the ministry level. “Now for anything important, we need to get Kandahar’s approval,” he said.

In other cases, rulings come directly from Kandahar without consultation with Kabul, though the decisions are formally announced by government ministries, he said.

The acting education minister was ousted in September after Akhundzada replaced him with the head of Kandahar’s provincial council as part of a wider reshuffle. The reshuffle also saw Taliban members from the supreme leader’s inner circle appointed to senior political and security positions at the provincial level.

Qari Muhammad Yousef Ahmadi, a deputy Taliban spokesman, denied any shift in the group’s policymaking or implementation.

“The leaders, ministers and members of the cabinet of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan make policies under the guidance” of the supreme leader, and his guidance is entirely based on Islamic law, Ahmadi said.

The recent rulings appeal to many members of the Taliban’s base, but they also threaten to expose critical divisions within the movement and test its ability to maintain unity.

For years, while at war with U.S. and NATO forces, the Taliban maintained a degree of diversity within its network of alliances. The movement’s more conservative wing is largely dominant in Afghanistan’s mostly rural Pashtun south, but commanders in the east and north were granted some autonomy in how they carried out the Taliban’s strict interpretation of Islamic law. In some districts under Taliban control, for instance, women were allowed to travel to nearby cities to attend university.

With the war over, it’s unclear whether the group is prepared to allow a similar level of autonomy within its leadership. While some cabinet members in Kabul and Taliban leaders at the provincial level disagree with the recent restrictions on the rights of women, these figures have not publicly voiced their dissent, fearing it would be interpreted as an affront to Islamic rule and undermine national unity, according to two Taliban officials in Kabul.

Some Taliban officials have suggested that rulings restricting women’s education and ability to work are temporary and could be adjusted once stricter gender segregation is introduced and if conservative dress is observed. But other officials have come out in strong support of the decrees.

The acting minister of higher education, speaking on Afghan television, accused women in universities of failing to observe a strict Islamic dress code and instead wearing clothing “women wear to go to a wedding.” And a Taliban spokesman in Qatar said that Afghan women do not need to work and that “if the international community wants to help women, they should deliver it to their husbands who will share with their wives.”

The restrictions have also sparked fierce international criticism and warnings from aid groups that any reduction in the level of humanitarian assistance could leave millions without the ability to feed their families.

“A part of the Taliban leadership appears either not to comprehend the chilling consequences of these latest decisions or they are indifferent to the suffering of millions of ordinary Afghans,” said Markus Potzel, acting head of the U.N. mission in Afghanistan. Potzel did not specify what part of Taliban leadership he was referring to but warned that some Taliban leaders also appear “prepared to take the country further into isolation away from the community of nations.”

Since taking control of Afghanistan, the Taliban has steadily cracked down on women’s rights. The majority of female government employees were immediately banned from coming to work in 2021.

In March, a surprise last-minute ruling banned girls from secondary school education. In May, an order heavily restricted how women dress in public, and in November, women were banned from public parks and gyms.

Despite many of the bans triggering global outrage and protests across Afghanistan, senior Taliban leadership has so far refused to overturn any of the decisions, defending them as internal issues that should free of outside interference.

Ahmadi, the deputy Taliban spokesman, said that the rulings are necessary for the Taliban to establish nationwide Islamic law and that the international community’s “responsibility” is to continue to help the Afghan people.

During the first months of Taliban rule, security was the group’s primary concern amid fears of a resurgence by the Islamic State group and a simmering resistance movement in the northeastern province of Panjshir. Now, more than a year later, Ahmadi said the group is also focusing on development and social issues. “These are the needs of the people, and they have expectations from us,” he said.

Haq Nawaz Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan, contributed to this report.

Susannah George is The Washington Post’s Afghanistan and Pakistan bureau chief. She previously headed the Associated Press’s Baghdad bureau and covered national security and intelligence from the AP’s Washington bureau.
Taliban hard-liners consolidate control with crackdown on women
read more

World Clerics’ Delegation Seeks Education for Every Muslim

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation is due to hold a conference on Afghanistan on Thursday.

A delegation of Muslim clerics, which has visited Afghanistan, on Tuesday called for ensuring the right to education for every Muslim and emphasized the need for girls’ access to education in Afghanistan.

The head of the delegation, Sheikh Mohammad Saghir, said they have discussed education for women and girls in their meetings with the officials of the caretaker government.

He said the Islamic Emirate assured that the existing problems would be removed.

“We had meetings with all leaders of the Islamic Emirate. In these meetings, we discussed the issue of education. The minister of higher education has pledged not to deprive all Afghan men and women of education,” he said.

“Education is necessary, therefore we call on the Islamic Emirate to pave the ground for the education of women as soon as possible,” said Mawlawi Hassibullah Hanafi, a cleric.

Meanwhile, a number of female students expressed their concerns over their “uncertain” future after the closure of schools and universities. They urged the Islamic Emirate to reopen universities and schools for them.

“The closure of the universities has caused concerns including the uncertain future which is awaiting for us and which caused long-term psychological pressure,” said Khadija, a student.

“We call on the Islamic Emirate to reopen schools and universities without any conditions because education is our right,” said Hassina Mutassim, a student.

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation is due to hold a conference on Afghanistan on Thursday.

The meeting is aimed at discussing the recent decision of the Islamic Emirate about the ban on women’s education and working at NGOs.

Secondary schools are already closed for girls over the past 480 days.

World Clerics’ Delegation Seeks Education for Every Muslim
read more

Pakistan releases 524 Afghan nationals from its prisons

Pakistan on Saturday released another batch of Afghan nationals who were thrown into Pakistani prisons in recent months.

The Taliban-run embassy in Islamabad said that 524 people, including 54 women and 97 children, have been released from Pakistani prisons.

The embassy added that the body of a Faryab resident, who died in a Pakistan jail last month, has been repatriated.

Refugees from Afghanistan have meanwhile voiced concern of the mistreatment of refugees by Pakistani police.

Zohra Wahidi Akhtari stated that the situation of refugees in Pakistan is alarming. “Immigrants are denied access to many services and live in fear. They are not allowed to work and their families are in a bad financial situation,” she added.

She said that Pakistan police treat refugees from Afghanistan very badly which is a violation of immigration laws.

A number of asylum seekers who sought refuge in Pakistan following the return of the Taliban to power stated that one of their biggest problems is their visas have expired.

Zabihullah, who worked for foreign institutions in Afghanistan, fled to Pakistan after the Taliban came into power in 2021.

“My documents have expired and I am in a bad situation. I don’t have a work permit. We are being chased by police, we can’t go to Afghanistan either. We ask the international organizations for migration to pay attention to the situation of Afghan refugees and put pressure on the government of Pakistan to stop harassing refugees,” he said.

A number of other asylum seekers also claimed that they were denied access to all public services including work, education, and health services in Pakistan.

Najibullah Ziyaee, an refugee who resides in Pakistan along with his family, said that they have no access to public services and that restrictions on migrants are increasing every day.

“We are fed up with life; Because there are so many problems that I don’t know which one I should raise. When we get sick, we don’t have access to a hospital. We are also not allowed to work. In Afghanistan, we could have been killed, and here [in Pakistan] we would die of hunger too,” he said.

Pakistan releases 524 Afghan nationals from its prisons
read more

In Kabul, Taliban rulers are changing the face of the capital

KABUL — Taliban authorities have embarked on an ambitious project to change the face of the Afghan capital, a crowded metropolis of 5 million that still displays the scars, monuments and fads of periods of civil conflict, foreign invasion and new-money opulence.

The Kabul municipal government, which provides utility services to homes and businesses and then collects fees to support its budget, is setting out to improve selected corners and neglected corridors of the city. It has 180 projects underway, including planting trees on median strips, erecting traffic-circle monuments and building major roads from scratch. The projected total cost is about $90 million.

In the affluent downtown enclave of Sherpur, blast walls have been removed from around showy mansions once occupied by warlords and government officials. Bulldozers have been grading and paving streets that were long closed to the public, shortening commutes and allowing residents to glimpse the abandoned lairs of the mighty.

“This is where powerful people lived. I was never allowed here,” said a 10-year-old boy who was playing cricket on a newly graded block. A passing Taliban guard chimed in. “These properties were all grabbed illegally. No one paid their taxes,” said Fawad Alokozai, 49.

In Dasht-i-Barchi, a run-down district across the city dominated by minority ethnic Shiites, municipal crews are smashing old houses to rubble as they prepare to build a connecting road to a major highway. The thoroughfare was originally envisioned 43 years ago by the first Afghan president, Mohammed Daoud Khan, who overthrew the monarchy and designed a master plan for the centuries-old capital that was never fulfilled.

“We have been waiting a long time for this,” said a gray-bearded, 68-year-old resident named Shahruddin, watching dust-covered workers with sledgehammers destroy a row of old mud-brick homes in the future boulevard’s path. He said some residents are worried about being compensated for their properties. “The Taliban are more honest than past governments, so we have to trust they will pay,” he said.

Naimatullah Barakzai, the spokesman for Kabul’s reconstruction initiative, said all international development projects stopped after the Taliban took power last year. “We don’t want to wait for them to start again or depend on foreign aid,” he said. Even though the country of 40 million faces economic hardship, he stressed, “We want to solve our own problems, and we want to make the city beautiful. We don’t want people to think Kabul is ruined now and that we don’t care about culture.”

Barakzai, 40, a longtime municipal official, said his office is using the authority of the new government to get things done, including the seizure of private properties. “No one is allowed to use their influence to refuse us,” he said. “We will pay them, but we will use our tools, and we will implement our plans.”

Unlike Afghan kings and the Soviet-backed modernizers of earlier eras, the Taliban religious militia did not leave a physical stamp on Kabul when it first took power in 1996 after a civil war that left much of the capital in ruins. That five-year reign was infamous for destroying non-Islamic, rural antiquities and landmarks, especially the towering 6th-century Buddha statues carved into cliffs in the northern province of Bamian.

During the past 20 years of elected civilian governments, Kabul underwent a construction boom, which was driven by Western aid and development projects. High-rise apartments created a new skyline, and supermarkets and sleek fashion malls opened. In some areas, streets were paved and storm drains dug. But years of relentless warfare kept foreign investment away, and critics said aid funds often went into contractors’ pockets. Refugees returning from years in Iran and Pakistan swamped poor communities, many already crowded and barely habitable.

One businessman who lives in Sherpur welcomed the new government’s efforts, although he recently lost half his house and nine ancient pine trees when the wreckers came. He said the capital had needed cleaning up in more ways than one.

“In the past, there was corruption and bribes, there were gangs and drugs, but that’s all gone now. If the municipality says they will pay me within the year, I believe it,” said Abid Baloch, 55. “The new government is honest, and it is changing both the physical and political landscape.”

One such change has been the dismantling of an urban fortress once occupied by Abdurrashid Dostum, a former army general, vice president and brutal militia leader now living in Turkey. For years, the structure loomed over a narrow city intersection, slowing traffic to a crawl. Once, police trying to arrest Dostum were unable to get past the blast walls, barbed wire and gun turrets. Now, those defenses are gone and pedestrians stroll in the surrounding lanes.

“This makes me feel like we have done something useful, that all my years of fighting were worth it,” said a Taliban security guard in his 50s named Khairullah, who was sitting next to a snack stand across the street. “We have brought peace, men are growing beards and going to mosques, and citizens are walking freely.”

Militarized structures built by departed U.S. and NATO forces — some overlaid with steel roofs that obscured entire city blocks — have been harder to beautify, especially those now being used by Taliban security agencies. Barakzai said municipal officials have been negotiating with such occupants to remove outer blast walls or hide them from view, so far with little result.

“We have no legal power to force anyone to cooperate or move. We can only file cases in the courts,” Barakzai said. He noted that one relative of a late Afghan president has refused to leave a longtime family home in downtown Kabul — part of which was due to be demolished — and may remain there indefinitely.

Some of the vacated residential palaces are still off-limits because their former inhabitants have been replaced by Taliban fighters, families and visitors. On July 31, when a U.S. drone strike in Kabul killed Ayman al-Zawahiri, the Egyptian-born al-Qaeda leader, he was living as a Taliban guest in a high-walled Sherpur mansion.

Other kinds of public projects are both highly visible and politically symbolic. Along with installing concrete lane dividers on busy boulevards, city workers are razing prominent traffic circle monuments. Several were built to honor slain anti-Taliban leaders such as Ahmed Shah Massoud and Abdul Haq, both killed in 2001. They will be replaced by abstract objects rather than Taliban heroes, though, because the movement’s strict Islamic code bans human likenesses.

In poorer areas of the city, the less visible, heavy-duty work of shoring up old roads and building new ones has been moving ahead rapidly. In Dasht-i-Barchi, the new avenue got underway last month with a rumble of heavy equipment. A crowd of residents gathered to watch, sad to see the old houses come down but happy that the community finally would be connected to Highway 1. The major north-south route between Kabul and Kandahar was built by the U.S. Alliance for Progress in the 1960s.

“I don’t know why they have to do this now, when winter is coming and people are hungry, but this road is something we need. I can remember my father talking about it when I was a boy,” said Mohammed Mohsin, 30, an unemployed butcher. “If it is finally happening with the new government, then we must all be glad.”

Pamela Constable is a staff writer for The Washington Post’s foreign desk. She completed a tour as Afghanistan/Pakistan bureau chief in 2019, and has reported extensively from Latin America, South Asia and around the world since the 1980s.
In Kabul, Taliban rulers are changing the face of the capital
read more

Transfer of Humanitarian Aid Packages to Afghanistan Suspended: Mehrabi

In a statement, the Da Afghanistan Bank denied the suspension of humanitarian aid packages to Afghanistan.

A former member of the Afghan Central Bank’s supreme council, Shah Mehrabi, said on Sunday that since mid-December 2022, United Nations flights have stopped transferring cash aid to Afghanistan as part of humanitarian assistance.

In a statement, the Da Afghanistan Bank denied the suspension of humanitarian aid packages to Afghanistan.

Mehrabi said that the suspension of cash aid will affect the stability of the Afghan currency.

“The suspension of humanitarian aid coupled with a halt of bank transfer in freezing of $7 billion of Afghanistan reserves will cause an increase in prices and pause in payment of education sector and health worker,” Mehrabi said. “As a result of higher prices, many women, orphans, and other ordinary Afghans will not be able to afford bread, flour and cooking oil and pay for other basic needs.”

“This will further exacerbate poverty and add to the suffering of ordinary Afghans,” Mehrabi added.

Mehrabi referred to the UN figures, saying that more than 70 percent of the Afghan population needs humanitarian assistance and many are close to starvation.

“It is important to point out that it poses a question about the purpose of suspending humanitarian aid, and who will benefit and suffer from it. I urge the continuation of humanitarian aid,” Mehrabi said.

Analysts said that the aid was suspended in reaction to the Islamic Emirate’s decision to ban women from working in NGOs.

“(They) should either bring changes in their decision or a humanitarian catastrophe will happen,” said Sayed Jawad Sijadi, an international relations analyst.

“If the aid is suspended, the people of Afghanistan will suffer the most from it,” said Mehdi Afzali, an international relations analyst.

This comes as the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a report that more than $3 billion is needed for Afghanistan’s humanitarian response.

Transfer of Humanitarian Aid Packages to Afghanistan Suspended: Mehrabi
read more

Aid chief: Taliban decrees against women paralyzing NGO work

By RIAZAT BUTT

Associated Press
7 Jan 2023

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Taliban’s “internal debates and extreme decrees” are paralyzing humanitarian work in Afghanistan, the head of a major aid agency told The Associated Press on Sunday, after he arrived on a week-long trip to talk to Taliban leaders about reversing a ban on women working for national and international non-governmental groups.

Jan Egeland, the secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, is the first NGO chief to visit Afghanistan for talks with the Taliban since the ban came into effect more than two weeks ago.

Authorities have barred Afghan women from working at NGOs, allegedly because they weren’t wearing the Islamic headscarf correctly. The ban follows a slew of moves that have severely limited or suspended women’s rights and education.

Aid groups, foreign governments, and the United Nations say women are vital for the delivery of lifesaving assistance in Afghanistan and are calling for the ban’s reversal. Many groups have suspended their operations, warning of dire and deadly consequences for a population already battered by decades of war, deteriorating living conditions and economic hardship.

The Norwegian Refugee Council says it has worked in Afghanistan since 2003 and employs 470 women. It helped more than 840,000 people last year and was intending to help 700,000 this year, the group said.

Egeland said that he was meeting Taliban leaders in the capital of Kabul and in the southern city of Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban movement and the base of the group’s supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada.

Egeland has already met the economy minister, who initially announced the ban, and other Taliban officials. Egeland indicated that those in Kabul were more willing to contemplate women returning to work because of their crucial role in delivering humanitarian aid.

“They all say that they want us to continue work and hope we will continue without females,” Egeland said in an interview Sunday at his group’s Kabul office. “But when I say we’re not willing or able to work with males only, they (Taliban officials) realize that the population is totally dependent on international assistance at the moment, food, shelter, sanitation.”

Women are needed to contact women, including female-headed households and widows, he said. Aid agencies say it is impossible for men to do this work because of Afghanistan’s social and cultural norms as well as the Taliban’s own prohibitions against the mixing of genders.

Separately, two aid officials have told the AP that they were given the impression by Taliban ministers in Kabul that they want women to resume their work at NGOs but that this decision lies with the leadership in Kandahar.

Egeland said the economy minister “sent us the message given by the supreme leader that we had to discontinue all work.” He said he is traveling to Kandahar because “it is there that the ideological and religious decrees come from.”

“The (Taliban’s) internal debates and extreme decrees have paralyzed our work,” Egeland said.

The NRC chief said it was impossible to meet the supreme leader in Kandahar but hoped to influence those around him.

Two weeks after the ban, it remains unclear how comprehensive it is, and some groups have reported that they are able to continue their work.

Egeland said this raises further questions.

“Can this be a religiously activated ban if some (women) are working and some are not? It’s not thought through at all,” Egeland said. “We can’t work with males only because we can’t follow their (the Taliban’s) rules and regulations.”

The Norwegian aid chief said the group’s female staff have complied with the Taliban’s dress codes, gender segregation rules and even the need to have a male chaperone on certain occasions. The damage caused by the ban will become worse the longer it continues, he warned, saying malnutrition and death is rising and maternal health is plunging.

On his trip, Egeland is also due to meet officials from embassies of Muslim-majority countries, such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia, who retain a diplomatic presence in Afghanistan and have condemned the Taliban crackdowns on female education and employment.

Despite initially promising a more moderate rule, the Taliban have widely implemented their interpretation of Islamic law, or Sharia.

They have banned girls and women from middle school, high school, and university, restricted women from most employment and ordered them to wear head-to-toe clothing in public. Women are also banned from parks and gyms.

Egeland said he was in Afghanistan shortly after the Taliban takeover in August 2021.

“All these promises were made. We were misled. What I would say is that the Taliban decrees on female workers, on education for girls is so wrong for Afghanistan, for the population, for the future, for the economy.”

He urged the West to send their diplomats back to Afghanistan to engage with the country’s new rulers because the population were the “same 40 million citizens they left behind.”

Aid chief: Taliban decrees against women paralyzing NGO work
read more

Iran, Pakistan Ministers Call for Inclusive Govt in Afghanistan

But the caretaker government in Afghanistan has repeatedly stressed that its government was inclusive.

The foreign ministers of Iran and Pakistan in a telephonic conversation emphasized the need for the formation of an inclusive government in Afghanistan, Iran’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Saturday. 

Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and his Pakistani counterpart Bilawal Bhutto Zardari also expressed concerns over the ban on women’s education and working.

“Amirabdollahian expressed his concerns about the problematic situation in Afghanistan. He voiced regret over the move to deprive girls of education in Afghanistan and stressed the necessity of forming an inclusive government in the country,” the statement reads.

Analysts said positions in public offices should be given to skilled and experienced people.

“The Taliban should hand over the activities to professional people. They should give posts to professional people in the administration to end criticism from neighboring and world countries,” said Torek Farhadi, a political analyst.

“An inclusive government is needed because of the situation, not because of the demand of the world and neighbors. Based on their demand, it is illegitimate but based on the demands of the nation, it is a legitimate call,” said Mariam Nayibi, a women’s rights activist.

The Islamic Emirate meanwhile urged the two neighboring countries to accomplish their “responsibilities” regarding the improvement of Afghanistan’s relations with the international community.

“The Islamic Emirate as responsible manages its affairs in the country based on the values and interests of the country. Other countries should fulfill their responsibility for the improvement of Afghanistan’s relations with the world, and other economic and business issues,” said the deputy spokesman for the Islamic Emirate, Bilal Karimi.

The international community has put the formation of an inclusive government as one of the conditions to consider the recognition of the Afghan government. But the caretaker government in Afghanistan has repeatedly stressed that its government was inclusive.

Iran, Pakistan Ministers Call for Inclusive Govt in Afghanistan
read more